The Throat of the World
The Throat of the World is the name given shortly after the founding of Azhahad the City to the pass that allowed it to connect East and West via a land route. The greatest throughfare on the planet and the key to Azhahad's immense prosperity, the Throat is heavily guarded and fortified - in the West using the river between itself and the nation of Loirecourt to make its defences all the more effective. There is only one road into Azhahad on each side of the Throat - centuries of fortification and land sculpting has made passage into the territory held by the city impossible to any number of travellers without passing through one of the Citadels. Small groups, no more than a dozen or score at most, can sometimes find ways through. But all too often they are caught by Guard patrols who know the areas far better - saying nothing of the other dangers that lurk in the hills and mountains that ring the territory. Safer to risk the far more mundane, and fairer, dangers of the Citadels. Eastern Citadel The smaller but no less advanced of the two Citadels, the Eastern Citadel stands guard over passage from Azhahad to the great desert that leads to theThanatocracy of Kemuliaan. Its center a high fortress-town astride the single pass through the mountains on the Eastern side of the Throat, the Eastern Citadel is well equipped and dangerous, yet far less militarised as the West. Whilst occasionaly the wall upon which brigand attackers have fallen in attempts to fight their way into the well catered lands beyond, the Citadel of the East has seen far less conflict in its time than that of the West that stood against the seemingly endless Legions of Paragon. The walls of the Citadel are strong; stone walls shielded by thick earthen berms against the possiblity of cannon fire with batteries of their own spread out across the lower wall as well as placed on some of the higher levels to grant longer range. A massive tower of stone rises hundreds of feet above the pass to grant unparalled vision as well as housing one of the Citadel's beacons on its top. Its barracks are well built to comfortably house two full regiments and their dependents, and as such are in a state or perpetual half-emptiness except in wartime. Yet even with the space dedicated to the Guard, the Eastern Citadel is a fortress much given over to hospitality to the travellers passing through its gates. As one of the closest settlements worth name to Kemuliaan, perhaps it makes sense. Yet the one thing that the Citadel does not have is any real criminal element. Oh of course, there are theives and petty smugglers, and even some other types - far more than in the West - yet the Guard assigned there have rebuffed any attempt by more powerful criminal elements to gain access to the levers that control much of Azhahadan commerce. Here, as in the West, the Guard wages an idelogical war within its rank against corruption, using the time regiments are assigned to the Citadels to effectivly reforge them in many cases. Such sharpness cannot fail to blunt when it encounters the grindstone of Azhahad the City, yet wearing it down takes time even for the powerful criminal element of the Harbor District. Yet even as they hate the Citadels for what they do to enable the Guard's proficency, the gangs and more powerful agents of Azhahad's underworld know very well that anything but the most subtle attacks on the Citadels is tantamount to commiting suicide. Western Citadel The crown jewel of Azhahadan martial splendour, the Western Citadel of the Throat is without doubt one of the greatest fortresses in the known world. A multi-layered stone and earth walled monolith, it traces a line across the (far wider) western pass on the eastern bank of the River Nica. Between the two lie the Fields of the Dead, the site of one of the most bloody and protracted sieges in history where Paragon threw itself against the Gate of the East. Close in sheer size to the city that built it, the Western Citadel is the heart of the Guard's power in Azhahad and it is here that those who volunteer to join it are taken for training. Upon the soil of this Citadel, the criminal element is effectively nonexistent - even more than in the East. Here the Guard reigns supreme, unbowed to the wealth and power of those who would seek to corrupt it and strengthened by the ancient valor that permeates the fortress. The Western Citadel is fully capable of housing fifty thousand soldiers within its massive barracks and was offered and used as a staging point for the war for sovereignty of Loirecourt undertaken by House Valere. Its vast housing and warehouses have stood it in good stead as the western gate to Azhahad, and whilst the searches are far more than cursory they are also fair and allow one who passes through them to bypass the rather more corrupt Azhahad the City customs officials. Over the years since Paragon's Rage, the Western Citadel has grown from a fortress into a fortress-town into a city built of martial splendour. Whilst smaller than Azhahad itself, the Jeweled Citadel now boasts a permanent population of well over fifty thousand. Farmers have transformed great sections of the Fields of the Dead into vibrant agriculture that allows the Citadel to support its own population with little in the way of required aid from Azhahad. Mining endeavours into the Ash Crown mountains have tapped seams of iron, copper and tin that are forged into the Guard's weapons and armour. And the Guard itself stands watch over the still growing trade nexus that connects Azhahad the City to the western markets. Its wealth and power are still growing comparative to Azhahad's, and it will almost certainly never catch up, yet it grants the Families of the Guard, all of whom hold permanent residence within the Jeweled Citadel, a powerful lever that can be used to influence the merchant-nobility of the Assembly.